Harold Teen definitely had a thing for swing! Debuting in 1919 and ending with the artist’s death, Carl Ed, in 1959, Harold Teen became a youth icon and embraced all things teen – including swing dancing.

Whilst trying to figure out the year this was patented (couldn’t) I ran into this site: about the history of the Thorogood Shoe Company (a UK site for an American company) which patented Neo-Cord soles for the WWII effort to protect soldiers’ feet from harmful substances in 1941.